Jan
17
Asturias 2
Posted by: | January 17, 2010 | Comments Off on Asturias 2
The first obvious characteristic of the second part is that it is written in the format of a play. The reader’s attention is drawn to the actions and setting separately from the dialogue, which makes it easier to visualise and follow the story. I especially liked the separation between dialogue and description because it is easier to re-read a certain short description a few times before moving forward in the text and therefore be sure to have understood and be able to picture the setting and context before reading the dialogue.
Second, I enjoyed the way the text was separated into the morning, afternoon and night themes in a flowing way (morning, followed by afternoon, night, and morning again, etc) that perfectly mirrored some of the first statements of the text: “ de la manana a la tarde, de la tarde a la noche, de la noche a la manana…”. I thought it emphasized a cultural “oneness” with nature that influenced all aspects of life, even how stories are remembered and told. I also found it extremely ingenious how these periods almost came to life through the dialogues in the text: the most “Cuac cuac cuacs” are heard in the morning, when nature comes to life and the first birds start singing, with the birdsongs progressively getting loud. The prominent (and I imagine loud) “cuac cuac” birdsong later fades off in the night when nature goes quiet. (This is especially obvious in the shorter last three cortinas.) For me this effect enabled me to better visualize and appreciate the different contexts of the morning, afternoon and night.
The transition between the three time-frames and their associated colors was also quite skilful. For example, although the morning (associated with the color yellow) is full or words that describe yellow objects (sun, corn) there are also occasional red items that appear (frijolillos rojos, sangre). The same occurs for the other colors, possibly to symbolize the interconnectedness between the three time-frames: one time-frame cannot exist without the others and although they are distinct periods, all three are nevertheless inherently interconnected.
Lastly, I found it interesting how one word was repeated in particular at the start of each Cortina, for example “sol”, “flecha”, or “juego”. It seemed to me as if these were used to set the mood for the actions and dialogues to come. Furthermore, these words provide for a lot of imagery and connotations therefore the words that appear most often in each section could almost be used together to represent and summarize the entire Cortina in which they appear.
